1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a file management system, a file management method, and a storage medium for storing a plural files therein, and further relates to a file management system which can search files, file management method which is applied to the file management system, and a storage medium for storing programs for executing the file management program.
2. Related Background Art
Conventionally, there is known an image management system in which a manuscript image such as a document or a drawing is read and appropriately edited and the image is recorded to a magnetic disk or an optical magnetic disk for a management.
In general, in this type of an image management system, image information obtained by reading a manuscript image is compressed before being recorded to a hard disk or an optical disk. In addition, index information for an image search is related with the image information for recording.
A required image is searched for on the basis of this index information and the image information is read out so as to be displayed on a display unit or the image is output to a record sheet by a printer. Furthermore, various types of image processing such as adding, editing, or processing an image is performed, if necessary.
Referring to FIGS. 27A and 27B, there is shown a block diagram of a constitution of a conventional and general document management system. FIG. 27A illustrates a block diagram of a constitution of an image filing system used for scanning a manuscript with a scanner and storing the image in a document database. A scanner 120 optically reads a manuscript and converts the read image to digital signals with a photoelectric conversion element or the like. A scanner control means 121 controls an operation of the scanner 120. An index input means 123 inputs an index for the read image. A database management part 122 manages the index and the image. A document database 124 is used for storing images or index information. In this diagram, arrows indicate information flows.
First, an image read from a manuscript with the scanner 120 is sent to the database management part 122 via the scanner control means 121. In addition, index information sent from index Input means 123 is sent to database management means 122. In the database management means 122, index information inputted from the index input means 123 is added to the image received from the scanner control means 121 and they are stored in the document database 124.
FIG. 27B illustrates a block diagram of a constitution used for searching for a desired image from the document database with a search part. A document database 130 is used for storing images and indices therefor. A database management means 131 manages the document database 130. A search means 132 searches for a desired image from the document database 130 and it searches for an image according to search conditions inputted from a search condition input part 133. A search result list management means 134 manages search results. A reference numeral 135 indicates a search result list. In this diagram, arrows indicate information flows.
First, conditions of an image required to be searched for are inputted from the search condition input part 133, an image which satisfies the conditions is searched from document database 130 through document database management means 131 by the search part 132, and said obtained search result is output to the search result list 135 via the search result list management means 134.
On the basis of the search result list 135, the search result list management means 134 can send image information of searched documents to image display part 141 through image display control means 140 and instruct Image display part 141 to display said image, or to Printer 143 through Printer control means 142 and instruct Printer 143 to print said image.
In addition, by substituting printer control means 142 for an image information change means and printer 143 for an export file storage part, the image information change means converts the information to a general type of an image file format and the export file storage part stores the file.
In the above conventional document management system, however, there are problems described below and their improvement has been desired. In other words, a document recording operation is separated from a search operation. Also in the recording operation, fixed procedures have been used for the image scanning and the index input operation. Furthermore, in the recording operation, the document recording operation and the index input operation have been performed for each document.
Therefore, in a recording operation for a plural documents, an operator must perform the scanning and the index input operation alternately, which makes operations complicated and leads to a low productivity.
Additionally, due to the separation of the recording operation from the search operation, incorrect data inputted by an incorrect operation must be modified following a search operation after the recording operation is terminated once, which requires a lot of operation steps and operation time.
Furthermore, in order to perform a batch operation for a plural images, it is possible to perform an operation for appending recognition marks to a plural images, finding images with the mark and performing a batch operation for the images. However, that kind of operation is very complicated since proceeding to next operation for rescanning of images or reinputting of indexes are needed after finishing a recording operation, proceeding a search operation, searching a requested image and checking the image whether the image is requested one.
This is also applied to an operation which converts a document to a typical file format of images. For example, in the case of outputting images in another document to an arbitrary record medium under the index input operation, lots of steps for operations and operation time are required.
In view of these problems, it is an object of the present invention to provide a file management system, a file management method, and a storage medium, which operabilities are improved.
According to one aspect of the present invention, there is provided a file management system in which a plurality of files can be stored and files can be searched for, comprising a list management means for arranging attribute information of recorded files, file search result information and index information of files per files and listing the information together in a single file list, an addition means for adding identical identification information to a plurality of files for which identical processing is requested to be performed in said file list, and a processing execution means for searching for files with said identification information in said file list and performing predetermined processing for the files which have been found.